European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - April 25, 1985, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Profile lady Antonia Fraser history is life of her present and future by Digby diet King features Syndicate in any lady Antonia Fraser would be an exceptional at age she has published 14 books and is one of the most distinguished historians and biographers of our noted for such works As Mary Queen of Cromwell and the Royal for entertainment she writes mystery novels featuring a female Sleuth named Jemima who has solved crimes in four including quiet As a which was recently adapted for for decades lady Antonia has been a Central figure in British social and intellectual she is vice chairman of the crime writers association and British the International writers her dinner parties and salons Are a Staple of London for six she has been a panellist on the bbl radio program my which might be described As the British version of information in the lady Antonias love life was the talk of the Fleet Street was agog when she left sir Hugh her husband of 20 to move in with playwright Harold sir Hugh was an outspoken conservative party member of parliament and the father of lady Antonias six Pinter departed from a marriage of similar duration to actress Vivien who said in a divorce suit that her husband had been possessed by the they now live together with lady Antonias six children in a Large mansion in Kensington and were married in a civil ceremony in when we sat Down in her luxuriously appointed suite at new York cites hotel Carlyle to discuss her latest the weaker was aware that i was in the presence of a formidable but i was even More aware of being seduced in the strictest conversational sense her feminine she is a tall woman whose proper rigidly formal manners and British accent suggest a certain but radiating through All this is an Earth Mother a voluptuousness that one cant help but the vessel 544 is a study of women in 17th Century England perhaps the most compassionate and revealing insight into the period that she has Given us in a career virtually devoted to the 17th what is the special fascination that this Era holds for her i think my interest in the 17th Century is related to the sense of ferment and revolution during that it was time of considerable political the entire course of British history was changed in of the figure of Cromwell is fascinating for All of the things he i am very interested in royalist and i think that you see people in a very raw state in the 17th without the overlays of fashion and illusion of the later i think that it is possible to understand the behaviour of individuals in the 17th Century without the views that separate us from other i work a lot in the British museum Reading and at the new York Public Library when my lady Antonia Fraser love life was the talk of London in the mid70s when she began her affair with playwright Harold husband is directing a play on but wherever i am doing my i am really living in the submerging myself in that world because i have a genuine curiosity about How life was lived then and How events i am passionately driven to get the facts to get a sense of what really in the Case of my recent i was moved by the diaries and letters written by women of the 17th and surprised to realize that women lot had reached a real Low Point in during that the woman life in almost every area of society had truly gone and i Felt i had to explore this and write about her feelings about the injustice of women positions in the 17th Century Are hardly Radical expressions of contemporary As she Points the historical situation was extreme women were practically the property of their fathers and with Little control Over their own lives or Only Rich widows or courtesans exercised any Power at All women Between the Ages of 15 and 50 were constantly bearing children most of whom died in infancy so they had Little Opportunity to do anything lady Antonias immersion in the 17th Century is almost comically Complete when she is i find myself thinking of life at court and wondering what is going on today being in even found myself dating checks and letters 1683 her More contemporary works Are also doing quite Well these with the recent airing of a bbl television series featuring the character of Jemima Only two of the 12 segments Are based on my the rest Are scripts by other writers using but i think that the results Are very i have begun to write a fifth mystery featuring this one will take place in for the no historical works Are under i spent such a Long time on this last i just want to catch my it was very and i wonder if i will find another subject quite so personally i like late roman history very and i have often thought of involving Jemima in a Story dealing with the roman history of but in not ready to go Back into the 17th Century just 20 stripes Magazine